Ship Time
by secooper87
Summary: "What does it mean," Buffy asked, "when a guy blows you off, every night, so he can spend more time with his ship?"
1. Chapter 1

Author's Note: Hi everyone! I'm back!

So I got sick, recently, and amused myself by rereading all of my old stories. I hadn't read them in years! And I was shocked at how much I honestly enjoyed them all. They were funny, delightful, sometimes deep, sometimes fluffy, and just generally interesting. When I got to the end, I was like, "Aw, but I want to read more!"

So... uh... I wrote some more.

The stories I'm working on, now, are just random interesting little ideas that came to me while rereading the rest of the stories - so they're all over the place in terms of timing and setting. There is also one story, "Paradox", which I am actually rewriting, because Doctor Who screwed me over by changing the cannon on me. I'm still putting final touches on that rewrite.

So, anyways.

This is a really cute little story I wrote. It starts out as just being cute. Then, a little ways in, I start chuckling. By the end, I'm always just cracking up with laughter. I figured that, if there was a good story to start with, it would be this one.

 **Here's the important thing to read, before you start on this story:**

You remember "Boyfriendish" and the Seo's World parts of "the Years that Never Were?" The alternate timeline, inside the Axis, in which Buffy never restores the Doctor's memories after "the Facksisil of Balime"?

This story is set in _that_ universe.

It takes place after "Boyfriendish" but before "Years that Never Were". If you're unclear on what the situation is with the Doctor and Buffy, I recommend reading "Facksisil" and "Boyfriendish" (or at least, the beginning of "Boyfriendish") to get an idea. "Facksisil" you should read all of, just because it's fun to read.

Enjoy!

* * *

"Hey! 96%!" Willow said, impressed, examining the results of Buffy's psych final. She flipped through the booklet, then stared at the comment at the end. "Oh, wow, Buffy! That's _really_ impressive."

There was a note from Professor Walsh:

'You show great potential in the social sciences, and I'm not just saying that because you and your boyfriend saved my life. Please see me during office hours. I believe you can go far in this.'

"Yeah — college has been going way better since… you know…" Buffy slurped on her smoothie, with a shrug.

"Boyfriendish?" Willow shot her a knowing look.

Buffy met the look with her own, but didn't confirm or deny this statement. She just kept slurping on her smoothie.

Willow put aside the booklet and poured salad dressing on her salad. "I guess when you have someone wandering around talking math and science all the time, you pick stuff up." She mushed the salad around, to cover it in dressing. "And it's been way quieter, in the demon vampire evil stuff world, with him around, too. Especially in the last two weeks. You've finally got time to study."

"Yeah," Buffy said, her smile dropping. "Lots of study." She blinked. Then tried to make it look like she was fine. "I mean, yeah. Stuff's great. If it weren't for him, Professor Walsh would be dead, Adam would still be around, and Faith…"

Buffy put down her smoothie. She suddenly looked really upset.

Willow grimaced. "Still some trouble in paradise, then?"

Buffy couldn't forget it. The Faith thing.

He'd done stuff with her — like, intimate stuff. And he'd _known_ it was her, when he did it.

"More like trouble in non-committy land," Buffy muttered. She fidgeted with her straw. "I mean — the whole 'ish' thing." She sighed. "You know. Not boyfriend. Just boyfriend- _ish_."

And other little things. Just a lot of little things.

Willow leaned in. "But Buffy — you know he loves you, right?" she insisted. She speared some salad with her fork. "I've seen what he looks like, when he runs into Giles' house, and you're not there. His face goes kind of…"

Willow tried to imitate his long, sad, lonely, slightly puppy dog face.

Buffy began fidgeting with the smoothie cup, starting to unravel parts of the paper on the outside. "Yeah. Yeah, I know. It doesn't matter about the 'ish'. I still know he loves…" She sighed. "Can I ask you something, Will? Like, one girl to another kind of something?"

Willow shrugged, taking a bite of salad, and gestured at Buffy to go on.

"What does it mean," Buffy asked, "when a guy blows you off, every night, so he can spend more time with his ship?"

Willow shot her a thoroughly puzzled look. "Ship?" she said, through a mouthful of salad.

"I mean, it's not… it's just…" Buffy fidgeted with the smoothie cup, again, looking even more uneasy. "He's been needing, like, a lot of… 'ship time', recently. Every single night. For two weeks. And when I saw him hanging out with Amber, yesterday… I just thought…" She peeled apart more of the cup. "Just… you know… maybe it's not really the TARDIS that he's…"

"He's totally into you, Buffy," Willow said. "If he needs to spend time with the TARDIS, I guess it's just because, without any memories, the TARDIS is kind of all he has that's just _his_."

Buffy nodded.

She knew he had a connection to his ship that she didn't understand. She just thought he'd give her some Buffy-time, too.

But lately… no Buffy time.

Just TARDIS time.

"Yeah," Buffy decided. She scratched at the peeled cup part. "You're right, Will. I mean, the TARDIS is important to him. I shouldn't think he's sneaking off to… I mean, he'd never…"

She trailed off.

(Except… there were a few times she'd gone into the TARDIS, to check on him, when he had 'TARDIS time' — and he hadn't been in there, at all.)

"Well maybe — he's bored with me," Buffy said. She poked the cup a little too hard, and the cup fractured, making smoothie mess splurt out across the table. "Like, we always used to save the world together. And now that things are so quiet that Giles says I don't even have to do patrol, anymore — maybe the Doctor's realized he doesn't really like me, that much, after all."

"No, Buffy!" Willow said. "He doesn't…!"

"Or maybe he liked Faith better," Buffy muttered.

Willow sighed, and helped Buffy mop up the smoothie mess on the table.

"Look, even if there are no monsters around, why don't you patrol with him, tonight, anyways?" Willow proposed. "You know, like, bonding time."

"Yeah," Buffy said, a smile trickling up her face. "Yeah — that could be fun."

She liked doing patrol with him. Especially when he decided to _really_ distract her so she wouldn't kill things. That was definitely her favorite part.

"Five minutes and he'll be all over you, Buffy," Willow said. "I know he will."

Buffy decided she was going to go with that.

"You're right; I'm melodrama-ing over nothing," Buffy decided. "A little patrol together, a little save the world together, and a couple of beating up goo-monster-alien-things — and we'll be back to normal. What could…?"

Willow kicked Buffy, sharply.

Buffy stopped talking, as she looked around, and realized a man in a pinstripe suit and red trainers was running over to her, his arms filled to bursting with papers and psychology books.

"There you are!" he cried, plonking the books on the table. "Been looking for you, for hours." He shuffled, a little awkwardly. "Well… I say hours. More like one hour. Well, I say an hour, but might have been more like 5 minutes." He grinned. "Got a bit distracted."

Buffy knew he meant distracted with wandering around campus and arguing with professors and finding aliens and other non-make-out-with-other-womenny things.

"What's with the psych-stack?" Buffy asked, trying to put this out of her mind.

The Doctor nudged it towards her. "Just… had a bit of a chat with Maggie Walsh. She wanted me to give you this. Thinks you've got a bright future, ahead of you."

Maggie Walsh had that new grad student — Nina — who was always hanging out around her office. He couldn't have been there for her, right?

Willow set down her fork. "You mean, you were breaking into Professor Walsh's office to make sure you'd completely destroyed any extra copies of her research about Adam, and she caught you at it, and then you lectured her about the morality of building inhuman killing machines?"

The Doctor scratched the back of his neck, awkwardly. "A bit."

Willow shot Buffy a pointed look, as if to say — _See? No reason to get worried._

Willow was right. Buffy had to stop being this insecure about their relationship.

(Remember what he did with Faith! Remember what he did with Faith! Remember…)

"Thanks," Buffy told the Doctor, moving the psych books so they were not in the middle of the exploded-smoothie madness. "Like, not just for getting all this stuff for me. But for yelling at Professor Walsh about the whole Adam-thing, too."

Buffy actually hadn't been planning to continue taking psych. For a start, she didn't want to run into Riley Finn, too often — because that was always awkward.

(And… you know… Nina…)

"Hey, I was just thinking — maybe we could go on patrol, together, tonight," Buffy proposed, scrunching up the remains of the broken smoothie cup into a ball. "I mean, we haven't done that in a while."

The Doctor shrugged, leaning back and putting his feet up on the table. "Nah. Not much going on, in the underworld, right now. 'Sides, I thought I'd try fitting a new temporal drive shaft into the TARDIS. See if I can't get the old girl working, again."

Buffy's face fell. More ship time.

Worse, still, the Doctor got that dopey little grin on his face, again — like he always did when he talked about 'ship time'. It was the kind of look that Buffy was pretty sure meant he was looking forward to tonight because he was really smitten with…

No. Bad Buffy. He wasn't using this as an excuse to see other women.

Stop being paranoid.

"Maybe you two should just think about it," Willow proposed, "and check in with each other, later."

"Ooh! Croutons!" The Doctor jumped to his feet, grabbed one out of Willow's salad, and tossed it into his mouth.

Willow yanked her salad away, defensively. "Hey, Mr. Licks-Everything-In-Sight, get your own!"

Buffy buried her face in her hands. Their relationship was fine. Their relationship was fine. Their relationship was fine.

It had to be.

* * *

What none of them noticed was that, off to one side, three cloaked figures stood beneath a tree, staring at them, intensely.

"Is that the Time Lord?" one whispered. "The one they call the Doctor?"

A second nodded. "Can't you feel it? His aura drips with time energies. The vortex flows through him."

The third smiled at the other two. "Yes. This is the Doctor. But he is weak. Without memories and, perhaps, soon, without friends." The third fixed interested eyes on Buffy. "I think the end of the world will come soon. Very, very soon."


	2. Chapter 2

Author's Note: Thought I might as well put up two chapters, tonight, just to get you into the story. So here's a bonus chapter for the evening!

When I reread "Elizabeth", I found a line that I'd forgotten, where Buffy says that if she were just a little bit more evil, she wouldn't want to let the Doctor leave Sunnydale; she'd be selfish and keep him there, with her. I was thinking about that a lot, when I wrote this story. This version of Buffy is the very-slightly-more-evil version of our normal Buffy. Not a lot. Just very slightly.

* * *

That evening, in a graveyard, Xander came running over to Willow, breathless. "Yeah, okay," he said. "You were right. Buffy _is_ on patrol with boyfriendish, after all." He coughed, pointing over at a mausoleum to his right. "They're just not patrolling the cemetery, anymore, if you know what I mean."

Willow frowned, confused. "They're not…?" Her eyes went wide. "Oh." She grinned. "Well, I guess that'll make Buffy happy."

"It doesn't make _me_ happy," said Xander. He wiped his eyes, with disgust. "I mean, why am _I_ always the one who walks in on them, doing it?"

They caught sight of a vampire, running off — and spun around, to chase it.

"And, by the way, the whole thing of 'distracting' Buffy to get her not to stake vampires," Xander said, as he ran, stake in hand, "is really, _really_ annoying. And it makes way more work for us."

They sprang at the vampire, who snarled, and turned on them both. It knocked Willow to the side, then rounded on Xander, sprouting fangs. Xander lunged for it, but it snarled and grabbed him by the wrist, yanking his head to the side, to expose his neck.

Before he knew what was happening, a blond blur flipped through the air and landed just behind the vampire. She spun it around, punched it in the jaw, and staked it.

Xander just stared.

Willow, getting up from the ground, also stared.

"What? No helpful-rescue thankfulness?" Buffy asked them. She shrugged, and twirled the stake in her hand. "Thanks for the appreciation overflow, guys."

"We… uh… thought you were with…" Willow started.

Buffy shook her head, with a sigh. "No. He's not around, tonight. More… 'ship time'."

Willow and Xander exchanged a look.

"What?" Buffy asked.

Xander, not embracing this task, walked over to her. "I think there's something you have to see."

Then he led her to the mausoleum he'd been in, just before.

Buffy stared, horrified — as she saw her boyfriendish making love, right then and there, to someone else.

* * *

Giles squinted at the passage in the book. "Ah." He tore off his glasses and squinted at it, again. "Now, that is worrisome." He tapped it. "Terribly, terribly worrisome."

He went back to his desk, and picked up a small metal orb. He compared it to the illustration in the book.

"Terribly, terribly, _terribly_ worrisome," Giles amended.

The phone rang, and he raced over to pick it up. "Hello?"

He breathed a sigh of relief, when he heard who it was.

"Oh, yes, I was expecting you'd be…" He looked down at the page, and frowned, as he listened. "Yes, yes, that's fine. However, I fear we may have a larger problem on our hands." He flicked his eyes over to the metallic orb, lying on his desk. "Yes, I did. It was created by the Boundless Three — a set of powerful mages, who are dedicated to…" He paused, cut off. "Well… yes, it is," Giles admitted. "But that's beside the point. The reason they left the orb, in the first place, is because…!"

He paused, as the voice on the other end cut him off, again.

"Will you please just listen? This is terribly dangerous!" Giles insisted. "They have another method by which they could easily…!"

And, yet again, he was cut off.

Giles set the phone receiver down on the counter, and pinched the bridge of his nose, massaging his eyes and waiting for the person on the other end to stop talking. "Oh, Lord. It's at times like this that I really wish Buffy were here."

When he heard the voice on the other end of the phone stop, he picked up the receiver, again.

"Perhaps it would be best if you simply came here and read the book, for yourself?" Giles said, warily. "At least, then, you could judge if this is truly 'nothing' — or if it's catastrophic."

Giles waited for the reply. Then, "Fine, fine. I'll be here."

And hung up the phone.

"I do hope Buffy appreciates, someday, how much pain and agony I'm going through, on her behalf," Giles muttered, trying to sooth a horrible headache. He brewed himself a cup of tea, hoping it would help. He feared this would be a long, sleepless night.

* * *

"Oh, yeah, I've seen this kind of thing _loads_ of times," Anya chimed in, as Willow struggled to comfort a crying Buffy. "A 'nighttime hobby' is _never_ just a nighttime hobby."

Xander sighed. "Anya, please." He gestured at Buffy. "A little sensitivity."

"No, she doesn't need sensitivity," Anya insisted. "She needs revenge." She marched over to Buffy, and sat down, next to her, on the bed. "How long has this been going on? The whole 'ship time' thing?"

"Two weeks," Buffy admitted, through tears.

Anya threw open her arms. "See? Two whole weeks of sleeping around, every single night — maybe even multiple times, each night — while you knew nothing!" She shook her head, crossing her arms. "You gotta do something that'll really get him for this."

"I don't think that's going to help, Anya," Willow put in. She put an arm around Buffy's shoulders. "I think she just needs to sit down with him and… you know… talk."

Anya rolled her eyes. "Since when did _that_ do any good?" She stood up, and shoved her hands on her hips. "Look, Buffy. There's only one way you're going to get through to him. He's a Time Lord. So you've gotta get rid of his ship."

Buffy stopped crying. She looked up, through tear-stained eyes.

"Uh… Anya, honey?" Xander asked, a little suspiciously. "This wouldn't happen to have something to do with the fact that you're still scared he'll get his memory back, jump into his time machine, and erase you from history… right?"

Anya decided to ignore that. "You gotta come at this from a position of power, Buffy!" Anya insisted. "Take his ship away, and he'll be begging you for a second chance. Time Lords become sniveling wrecks without their ships."

Buffy thought this over.

A small smile trickled across her lips.

"Buffy, think about this," Willow urged her. "You're upset, I know, but — you can't just act irrationally, here! I mean, his ship is really important to him, and taking it away…!"

"Can I bring it back, like, in a little while?" Buffy asked Anya. "You know, after I feel like he's learned his lesson?"

Anya's face fell. "Well… after about 24 hours… but… why would you even want to? I mean, wouldn't it be better if we just let the Uncreator stay here, shipless, and unable to… you know… uncreate?"

"And that confirms, completely, Anya's motives, in this," Xander said, pointing at her. Then, turning to Willow, "As far as I'm concerned — there's no reason not to. Take away the ship, and he'll have no excuse to run off, at night. Buffy can confront him about what he's been doing." He shrugged. "It's not like the Doctor can fly it, anyways. What's the harm?"

"There's a spell," Anya proposed, dragging an old book out and blowing some dust off the cover. "If you've got your TARDIS key, and are trusted by the Time Lord that the TARDIS is connected to, you can make it work. The spell will yank the TARDIS into the vortex for at least 24 hours. Then you can summon it back, using the counter-spell." She looked around herself, at the items on the shelves, nearby. "It's pretty easy. I think we've already got all the stuff we need, for it, here."

Buffy jumped to her feet. "Then let's do it."


	3. Chapter 3

The Doctor sniffed the book. "What's this written on? Not paper." He crossed his eyes, looking at the pages.

When he brought it up, to lick it — Giles yanked it out of his hands.

"Good grief, man," Giles muttered, slamming it down on the table. "It's velum. Will you please pay attention to what's written _inside_ the book, instead of the book, itself?"

"Velum?" The Doctor whipped a pair of brainy-specs out of his pocket, and perched them on his nose, still analyzing the pages. "What? From an Earth animal?" He felt the pages between his fingers. "Naw. Can't be. That's not dye, making those pages look a bit blue. That's melanosomes."

Giles massaged his temples.

His blinding headache was getting worse.

"And what, exactly, is written in this not-so-human book of yours, Rupert…?" the Doctor began, picking it up and opening it to the bookmarked page. He stopped, as he read it. "Ah. I see." He put it down. "Well, that's a bit troubling…"

"Rather more than a bit," said Giles. He gestured at the metal orb on his desk, which they'd found, last night. "That is one of the Orbs of Uerzeno — no doubt put in place by the Boundless Three. They are already _here_ , Doctor, and they will not rest until they bring about the apocalypse."

"Yes… yes… got that…" The Doctor reflected on it all, his brow furrowed. He tapped his finger against the part of the text he found most disturbing. "Clever. Quite clever. Didn't think of that." He peered at the page — then turned it sideways, and peered at it, again (just in case he'd missed something). "Would probably even work — given the nature of the energies we're dealing with."

Giles took off his glasses, cleaning them, as he tried to compose himself. At least, now, he was being believed.

The Doctor snapped the book shut, and grinned. "Well — lucky for us, I've got the TARDIS around! Good old TARDIS! They can't touch me, in there — and, with my modifications, I've got the TARDIS well and truly blocking their signal, now. Nothing they can do to end the world."

Giles put his glasses back on. "Yes, well, considering all we've learned — I really think it's time we brought in Buffy."

The Doctor waved his hand. "Told you. Not till Friday." He glanced back at Giles, pointedly. "12:48 PM on Friday, to be exact." He turned back to the book, and sniffed the front cover, trying to work out the mystery of the melanosome pages, again. "'Sides, this isn't something she needs to deal with. Not hard at all. I got the TARDIS, so — easy peasy!"

Giles sat down, across from the Doctor. He stared at him, for a little while. Then, quietly, "I respect what you're trying to do for Buffy. You know that." He yanked the book out of the Doctor's hands, before he could lick the cover. "But I saw what she went through, when she sent Angel to Hell. I won't allow her to go through that, again."

The Doctor shot him a cheeky grin. "That your way of saying you don't really want me dead, after all?" He picked up the Orb of Uerzeno, analyzing it, twirling it about in his fingers. "That makes a change." He gave the orb a lick, smacking his lips, thoughtfully. "Hm…"

Giles buried his face in his hands. "In general, I don't," he muttered. "But if you lick one more item — I cannot be held responsible for my actions."

* * *

Buffy took out her TARDIS key, and placed it in the circle of items — watching as the light from the candles flickered across it.

She and Anya sat, facing each other.

"Tinoshevedzera kune simba revarwi," said Anya. She reached out, to Buffy, and took her hands. A zap jolted through them both. "Nguva inopfuurira mberi uye saizvozvo isu."

"As the rivers of time feed the sea of the vortex," Buffy said, feeling the power increasing, between them, "allow us the ease of passage, to move the TARDIS into that vortex. Feel the heart…"

* * *

In a small clearing, outside, the TARDIS began to flash and make discordant noises.

* * *

The Doctor suddenly sat upright, smile tumbling off his face.

"No," he said, feeling something wrong, in his head. "But that can't…! No one could possibly…!"

Giles blinked at him.

The Doctor jumped to his feet, and raced out of Giles' house. "The TARDIS! Quickly!"

* * *

"Simbura chikepe chenguva iyo Ishe kumucheto kwemazuva," said Anya, as she let go of Buffy's hands and flicked water over the TARDIS key. It glowed. "Munhu anotumira anovimbwa uye ane simba."

* * *

The TARDIS, outside, gave a groan, and a shudder.

* * *

"I am the entrusted and beloved of the Time Lord," Buffy said, sprinkling sand around the TARDIS key. "In the name of the Slayer, by the power of Sineya, first of the Ones, I ask to remove the ship from this world."

"Muzita rekutsiva, tiratidzei mwoyo wemashini, uye tumirai kure," Anya said, holding out her hands, palms up. "Kubvisa kunyaradza kubva panguva yenguva yaIshe."

A red energy flashed out, from the TARDIS key. The key began sparking, beneath the spell's power.

"Move," said Anya and Buffy, together. "Move. Move!"

* * *

Giles' car pulled up to the blue police box, and the Doctor jumped out, sprinting towards his TARDIS. It was groaning, wheezing, fading into and out of existence, as if trying to decide whether or not to dematerialize.

The Doctor, racing, reached out a hand to grab the door — but it disappeared before he could reach it.

He stared, in horror, at the spot where his TARDIS had once stood.

A look of absolute devastation swept across his face.

"Gone," he breathed. "Just… gone."

He stepped into the indentation where the TARDIS has been, a few seconds before. Held out a hand, as if to find some trace of _something_ he could use to bring the TARDIS back.

There was nothing.

It was gone.

The Doctor fell to his knees, head drooping.

Giles wasn't completely clear what the Doctor's emotional connection was to his ship — but he knew it was vital the Doctor think of the more practical implications of this.

"Doctor," Giles said. "I'm quite sorry, but if the TARDIS is…"

"She's not even in my head, anymore," the Doctor muttered, his hands threading through his hair. "Just — gone. It's like… a part of me has been ripped away."

The lonely echo of the wind mirrored the lonely echo inside his head.

"If the TARDIS is gone," Giles insisted, a little more firmly, "then what's left to stop the end of the world?"

The Doctor snapped his head up. He grimaced, realizing that Giles was right.

He jumped to his feet.

"I'll have to find another way," he said, trying to snap himself out of it — although there was still a haunted look in his eyes. "No TARDIS, no higher technology, no…!" His eyes lit up. "Aha!"

He brought out his sonic screwdriver, along with the Orb of Uerzeno from Giles' house. Began cobbling something together, then stuck the sonic inside and turned it on.

"Right," the Doctor said, putting the top on the orb and handing it back to Giles. "That should block most of it — for about three hours. Might be a bit of temporal turbulence, but… still. Better that than end of the world." He spun on his heels. "Meanwhile, that means we've got three hours to find a more permanent solution!"

"It would block out their _current_ method," Giles reminded him. "Not the alternate method, as described in that book."

"Which is why I'll be building my brand new, absolutely brilliant apocalypse-preventing machine at a place that will be very well defended," said the Doctor, "with the highest technology available on Earth, at the moment, and inside a hidden secret base."

Giles stumbled back, horrified. "You don't mean…?"

"The last remains of the Initiative!" The Doctor beamed. "Oh, yes!" He raced to Giles' car and slid into the drivers' side. "Find Elizabeth. Warn her." He took out the keys he'd pick-pocketed from Giles, turned the engine, and the car roared into life. "Moment this thing finally breaks through, it'll target the most temporally complicated person born on this planet. That'd be Elizabeth."

Giles ran to the car and yanked open the passenger door. "You want me to leave you alone? Are you mad?!" He yanked the book out of his pocket and waved it at the Doctor. "What part of, 'The blood of a Time Lord shall summon the monster all the sooner' didn't you understand?!"

The Doctor sighed, frustrated. "I don't like it any more than you," he said, "but one of us has to cobble together a complex, four-dimensional machine, and the other has to brave vampires in a cemetery in order to find Elizabeth and warn her. Now, I know which one I'm better at. How 'bout you?"

Giles paused, for a long moment.

Then, finally, conceded the point, and stepped away, shutting the door. "Just be careful, Doctor," he warned. "The Boundless Three are masters of illusion. They are known for creating images that can twist love into hate, laughter into tears, and confidence into fear."

"Not a problem! Mind's brilliant! Time Lord!" the Doctor reminded him, and floored the gas pedal.


	4. Chapter 4

Forrest shoved down another box he was loading up, on behalf of the military, beside Riley's. "Don't look, now," he said. "But it's the guy who saved all our asses and stole your girlfriend."

Riley glanced over his shoulder.

And froze.

He wasn't completely sure how to feel about the Doctor. He supposed he couldn't really hate the man — after all, everyone at the Initiative would be dead, several times over, if not for the Doctor. But he still felt a sting of pain, every time he saw him.

Or Buffy.

The Doctor wasn't running towards Riley, anyways. He had, of course, immediately zeroed in on Maggie Walsh, and was sprinting towards her, rambling on at a hundred words a minute and waving his arms about, frantically.

"Considering the fact that Walsh tried to kill him, the first time she met him," Riley commented, watching Walsh and the Doctor, "I'm surprised how close they've gotten."

"Hey, not just anyone can save a person from a Polgara Demon spike," Forrest replied, with a shrug. He headed off, to gather up another box. "Well. This place isn't gonna pack itself up."

That's when the lights went out.

And, suddenly, the people within the Initiative looked around and realized that every single one of the empty containment cells had been filled — by demons with glowing yellow eyes and white glowing claws. None of the containment cells had functional front doors, anymore — that had already been shut off, to prepare for disassembly.

Professor Walsh sprinted to the controls, trying to get the containment cell doors working, again, and contain the creatures.

"What are you doing?" the Doctor cried, trying to pull her away from them. "Maggie, listen to me! You're overloading the electricity to both the cells and this console. You're going to…!"

A zap of energy flashed out from the console, through the floor and across the Initiative. And, in a single moment, every person, there, blacked out.

* * *

Buffy was actually humming to herself, as she walked back to the mausoleum. She knew she shouldn't like this as much as she did, but… Anya had been right. Revenge did feel kind of great.

It had hurt, so much, seeing him like that… with someone else.

Now, Buffy could make him hurt, like he'd made her hurt.

She could still hear them going at it, inside, as she approached. She'd at least thought that he'd _notice_ what she'd done. But, no. As she stepped into the doorway, she could still see him there, naked, with someone who was very obviously not her gasping beneath him, and it made her blood boil just to see it.

"Doctor," Buffy said.

That stopped them.

They both looked over at her, and sprung to their feet, separating. The Doctor held out a hand. "This… isn't what it seems!" He glanced over at the woman. "Well, it is, but… what can I say? I'm brilliant at it!"

Buffy felt rage rising inside of her.

"Thing is, you're not really all that pretty," he told Buffy, going back to the other woman. "Bit clingy. Bit annoying. And… well… you pong something awful."

Buffy grabbed the metal candlestick holder from beside her and brought it crashing down, between them.

They skittered away from each other, suddenly silent.

"How dare you?!" Buffy said, rounding on her boyfriendish. She brandished the candlestick holder, as he held up his hands, backing away from her, unable to speak. "I trusted you! I thought…!"

She swung it at him — but he ducked, and it clanged against the wall of the mausoleum. The clang seared through her, making the world… almost wobble, around her… as her head swam with images of past and present and future, in a burst of energy.

Then the wobble was gone.

And she was back to threatening her boyfriendish.

"I thought you loved me," Buffy said.

"I know." The Doctor winked. "That was what made it fun."

This made Buffy even angrier. She started to wonder how much she could beat him up before she needed to worry about regeneration being an issue. She swung at him, again — and, again, he ducked.

"Buffy!" called a voice, behind her.

"You lying, cheating bastard!" Buffy shouted, swinging the candlestick holder, again. She stumbled, a little, as another burst of time fluttered through her head… and then was gone. She raised the candlestick holder for another swing. "How could you?! How…?!"

Someone, behind her, grabbed the candlestick holder and used it to spin her around, to face him.

It was Giles.

He looked thoroughly disheveled and breathless, as if he'd been running for a while. He also seemed slightly panicked.

"Buffy, listen to me," Giles said, "you are in terrible danger. Everything's gone wrong, the world is about to end, and if you wish to survive the night, we must assist the Doctor in any way—"

Buffy almost swung the candlestick holder at Giles' head, she was so angry.

"You're on _his_ side?" Buffy shouted, pointing behind her. "How could you?! After what he did?!"

"After what who…?" Giles looked behind Buffy. Then blinked. Blinked again. "Oh. I'm sorry. I didn't recognize him without the clothes." He flicked his eyes away. "Yes, well, that's really rather disturbing, and something I would very much like to forget."

"The thing is, Elizabeth," the very naked Doctor continued explaining to Buffy, "I wasn't lying, exactly, when I said I was going to my ship." He gestured at the other woman. "We started doing this, together, inside the TARDIS. We just… well, we thought it might be fun to have a change of venue. I did the same thing with Faith."

Buffy felt the rage boiling over, in her veins. "You…?!"

Giles spun her back around. "Buffy, look at me. It's not him. It's an illusion — dredged from your own mind. Your worst fear and worst jealousy, sprung to life."

Buffy was still shaking with anger. "I don't believe you."

"In fact, this isn't even the second woman I've done this with," the very naked Doctor said. "I do it almost every night, always with another woman. After you fall asleep, I'll often pop off to the TARDIS with a very beautiful…"

"He's been cheating on me for at least two weeks, Giles!" Buffy insisted, pointing at him. "I _knew_ there was something wrong, when he wouldn't hang out with me, at night. I _knew_ that, when he wouldn't let me patrol, it was because he didn't want me to see…!"

"The Doctor came to me, two weeks ago," Giles cut in, before this silliness could go any further, "because he'd had a chat with Maggie Walsh. Walsh told him that you were brilliant, but overcommitted. You were too busy saving the world. The Doctor was quite concerned about that. He asked me if he could take over for you — save the world in your place — until at least this Friday, so you could properly study for your final exams."

The very naked Doctor stopped talking.

He seemed suddenly far less substantial.

"I only just left him," Giles said. "He's been in constant communication with me, all evening, trying to save the world."

Buffy just stared at Giles. "He… hasn't been sneaking off to have an affair?"

"No," Giles confirmed. "Most certainly not. I can confirm it." He sighed. "He didn't want you to feel guilty or responsible. He thought… he'd just take care of it all. You never needed to know."

Buffy reached into her pocket, for the TARDIS key. She _had_ mentioned, while the Doctor happened to be around, that she was concerned she wouldn't have time to study. But it had just been a gripe! A jab at Giles, for giving her so much Slayer stuff.

In the past, when she'd complained, like that, no one had ever taken her this seriously.

"Over the past two weeks," Giles said, a little bitterly, "the Doctor has been, quite possibly, the most irritating, annoying, and infuriating person in my life — and has very nearly driven me mad. He rambles in technobabble. He licks everything. He raids my jammy dodgers and my tea and barges in, at all hours of the night. And, worst of all, he refuses to kill _anything_ without first giving it a chance to choose a better way!" He took a deep breath. "But, all that being said and done, he _has_ done a rather admirable job filling in for you — allowing you to complete your studies."

The very naked Doctor vanished, completely.

"He's really been doing my job, for me, this whole time?" Buffy checked. "Not cheating on me?" She shook her head. "But why didn't he ever stop by, or hang out, or have some… you know… Buffy-time?"

"Yes, well, if you'd seen how much evil we've been facing, over the last two weeks, you can understand why he's been a bit busy." Giles met her eyes. "Buffy, the man is insufferably annoying — but he is entirely devoted to you. Whatever you saw, tonight, is an illusion conjured by your own mind."

Buffy glanced at where the illusion had been. It wasn't there, at all, any more. All that was left was a small metal orb, glowing faintly. She went over and picked it up, examining it, with a frown.

"Because of this?" Buffy asked.

"An Orb of Uerzeno," Giles said, nodding, "locked onto your mind." He took it from her, a sad expression on his face. "I'm afraid I got caught by another one, last night. I thought I saw the Doctor… well… murdering you."

Buffy bit her lower lip. She could just imagine what kind of rage that would have sent Giles into.

The Doctor was probably lucky to get out of that one alive.

"You know," Buffy said, shoving her hands into her pockets, "it's kind of weird that both our visions caused us to get anti-Doctor-rage."

Giles put the orb away, into his pocket. "It's not," he said. "The simplest way for the Boundless Three to achieve their goals and end the world would be using the blood of a Time Lord."

Buffy blinked. "Wait, _what_?!"

"The orbs," Giles explained, "are sent by the Boundless Three, three mages who seek to end the world by summoning, into this mortal plane, a creature from the vortex of time. To do this, they can either use a difficult and complex summoning spell to send some sort of special temporal signal — which the Doctor has been blocking, using his TARDIS — or, they can lure it here with the blood of a Time Lord."

Buffy felt a chill run through her.

(Oh, God. And she just sent the TARDIS away!)

"How much bloodiness?" Buffy checked. "Like… a drop, or…?"

Giles took out the book, and opened it to the correct page. "Let's see… 'then they shall bind the Time Lord, and shall they paint upon the ground, in his blood, the holy symbols. And they shall continue to keep him firmly restrained, lest his agonized writhing…'"

"Agonized _what_?!"

Giles frowned, gave a grimace, and muttered, "Yes, well, we don't need to get into all the unpleasant details on that…" He skimmed the next bit, "…or that… or that…" He skipped to the next section, and continued reading aloud: "'...and with each word of power shall they bleed the Time Lord, until his skin begins to glow gold and his body ripples with energy — and then, shall the last word be spoken, and the Dark Soul of Time shall enter this world and absorb the Time Lord's energy, and it shall devour the world and all shall end.'"

So… yeah.

Not just a drop.

"Where is he, Giles?" Buffy demanded. She could feel that weird explosion of past, present, and future inside her head, again, and she struggled to hold back the pain. "I have to get to him."

"Are you quite all right?" Giles asked her.

Buffy had a feeling she really wasn't. And she also had a feeling that there was a reason _why_ she really wasn't.

A reason that involved a certain boyfriendish being ceremonially sacrificed to a demon.

"Just take me to him!" Buffy shouted. "I think we might already be too late."


	5. Chapter 5

"Ow! Ow! Ow! Ow! Oi, careful where you poke that!" the Doctor said, trying (but failing) to break out of the iron manacles that now bound his wrists and ankles to the floor. He was also squirming in order to make it as difficult as possible for them to continue to slice knives across his skin — which they were also doing. They were cutting him, soaking their paint brushes in his blood and using those to paint intricate patterns across the ground, around him.

Worse, still, they'd stripped him naked.

And since he knew Buffy was still cross with him about that incident with Faith, she'd be practically guaranteed to believe he'd been out here having an affair, instead of being out here getting sacrificed to some great big temporal nasty that was about to end the world.

"I think I might be a bit rubbish at domestics," the Doctor reflected, as they continued to paint their symbols on the ground. "Or maybe I'm just a bit rubbish at… ow! Oi, watch the knife!"

He could already feel the vortex-creature rippling through time. It had smelled his blood, and was creeping towards them.

"Look, before this goes too far," the Doctor proposed, "how about we discuss this, over a cuppa? Bit of a chin-wag! Oh, and some jammy dodgers! Need those. And iced cream! Or even—"

"Silence, alien!" shouted one of the Boundless Three.

"You shall pay for your garrulousness!" shouted a second one, who was now approaching with an even bigger, nastier-looking blade — and some stencils.

The Doctor had the unnerving feeling that they were approaching the part of the ceremony where they carved him up like a Halloween pumpkin.

"Or… I could help you end the world another way!" the Doctor offered. "Hopefully, a way that involves trousers."

The third member of the Boundless Three stuck a piece of duct-tape over his mouth.

Right…

This wasn't going to be pleasant, at all.

"Now, hear us, oh Dark Soul of Time!" chanted the second one, positioning the stencil and readying the blade. "For here, upon the body of this Time Lord creature, we carve the symbols of your power!"

Yep.

Pumpkin.

Well, on the one hand, if he was carved up, perhaps Buffy would think it was slightly less likely that he was having an affair. On the other hand… the Doctor didn't actually know if it was less likely, because maybe humans were into that sort of thing?

Blimey.

What a disaster!

He tried to ask them to at least let him write her a note explaining that it wasn't his _fault_ that he wasn't wearing trousers — but then the carving started, and trousers became the least of his worries.

* * *

"They don't know a thing," Buffy concluded, as she finished talking to everyone at the Initiative. She tossed the orb she'd found, here, up and down, a few times. "They were taken in by one of these. The Doctor saw through it and tried to stop them, but Professor Walsh overloaded the machines and sent an electric jolt through everyone here."

"The Doctor was trying to take over from me, at the machinery, when we were zapped," Professor Walsh put in, gesturing at the console. "He'd have gotten twice as much as the rest of us."

Giles nodded, gravely. "Which means, of course, that he was taken. And could be anywhere, now."

Buffy stopped tossing the orb up and down. She suddenly had a very pensive look on her face.

"No," she decided. "He'd have found a way to tell us where he went. I'm sure!" She began to look around the Initiative, even more carefully. "He'd have dropped something, or left something, or made some mark, or…!"

Buffy stopped.

Looked down at the orb in her hand.

"The orbs are linked to our minds," Buffy said, reasoning it out. She tossed the orb, in her hand, to Walsh, and then ran over to Giles, to collect the one that had been locked onto _her_ — in the mausoleum. "And I have one linked to mine! And my Slayer senses link me to the Doctor!"

"Buffy, it's designed to latch onto your worst fears about your relationship," Giles insisted, unwilling to give it to her. He stepped backwards. "It won't help you find him. It'll simply…"

Buffy laughed. "Giles — it's not magic. It's a high-tech gizmo thingy, designed to modify the brain, the same way an implanted chip can modify the brain." She spread open her hands. "Look at where we are."

Giles looked about himself — at the Initiative, the one place that _really_ knew how to interface technology with the brain.

And realized… Buffy was right.

If anyone could get that orb to help Buffy find the Doctor, it would be this lot.

"Perhaps the Doctor had something of a point, about you being brilliant but overcommitted," Giles said, taking the orb out of his pocket and handing it to her. "That's… really quite clever thinking."

* * *

The only thing worse than getting carved up like a Halloween pumpkin was when the Boundless Three finally shed their mysterious-looking black robes, and revealed themselves to be bikini-clad demon women.

"Oh, you're just doing this to me, on purpose, to make me look bad!" the Doctor tried to complain — although the duct tape made it sound more like, "flumf murmf ma murf urf flurf fuffurf."

Honestly, what was it with Sunnydale demons trying to kill him, and a lack of clothing? And why _him_ , specifically? He was fairly certain Xander would give his right arm to be constantly chased by scantily clad demons. And yet, they always had to pick on the hapless Time Lord!

"Listen, you're about to kill me and end the world," the Doctor tried to say, through the duct tape. "Couldn't you at least let me die with some dignity?"

They began to dance around him, reciting incantations that'd amplify their psionics using the Earth's morphic field, and also waving around a whole lot of very threatening-looking knives.

Brilliant.

The Doctor figured the best way to stop the end of the world was to simply force himself not to regenerate. Which meant, of course, that he'd die (which he wasn't thrilled about, to start with) but Buffy would survive — long enough to see him, dead, naked, and surrounded by bikini-wearing women (which he was even less thrilled about).

"Rubbish at domestics," the Doctor tried to mutter through the duct-tape. "Absolutely rubbish at domestics."

* * *

"Thing is, I basically cheat on you all the time," said the not-real Doctor of Buffy's darkest nightmares, as he skipped off and led them to the real one. "With anyone! I'm not picky. I just do it because I want you to feel really horrible about yourself."

Buffy gritted her teeth, and glanced at the Initiative scientist who'd reprogrammed the orb. "You couldn't have changed it to latch onto my non-jealous side?"

The Initiative scientist huffed. "Considering I had an extremely short amount of time to decipher impossibly complex alien technology, reprogram it, and still make it all work, at the end — I think I did pretty well."

Whatever.

At least Buffy had managed to convince Professor Walsh to keep the army guys and their taser blasters away. She knew the only thing worse than showing up to save the Doctor with a not-real-version who talked openly about how much he was cheating on her — was showing up with a whole bunch of guns.

Behind Buffy, Maggie Walsh was running beside Rupert Giles.

"You know, she's _really_ smart," Walsh said to Giles, as they ran. She nodded at Buffy. "I run a tough class. And she aced it."

Giles gave a pointed cough. "You do recall that you recruited her for your Initiative, and then tried to kill her on her first mission?"

"Like I said — I run a tough class," Walsh confirmed. She didn't mention that she also attempted to kill the Doctor, possibly because her attempt on his life was the only reason she'd survived being skewered by Adam. "If you let her leave Sunnydale, she'll really shine. If you don't, she'll wind up flipping burgers, for a living, at the Doublemeat Palace. Think about that."


	6. Chapter 6

Author's Note: And the end. I'll try to post the new Paradox next. I'm a little busy so I can't guarantee that I'll be able to post it all at once.

Enjoy!

* * *

The air wobbled, as a thousand whispers of times future, present, and past came closer and closer to the world. Time boiled beneath the surface, each handful of moments bubbling up and creating tiny bursts across the world.

A tree, caught in one such boiling bubble, reverted into a sapling.

Part of the dorm building began to crumble, as it aged.

A man, caught by the bubble, became a little boy, again.

And yet, behind these bubbles, came the distant cawing of a creature from deep, deep down inside the vortex. Its wings flapped with death. Its eyes glowed with time. Its talons glistened with the shine of memories best left forgotten.

The air wobbled, again, as the creature flew closer and closer to the point of entry into this world.

* * *

"Dark Soul of the Vortex," the scantily-clad demon ladies called, as they danced around the Doctor, their blades ready to cut, "harken unto the Time Lord! May his blood open the vortex and may time pour out from him."

They gathered around him, knives poised above his hearts and one above the center of his forehead. He could see them glittering in the candlelight.

Oh, this was not the way he wanted to die!

"Erkriask! Erantor! Rezisitray!" they screamed. As they said each word, a symbol on the ground, beside the Doctor — drawn with his blood — glowed. "Erkriask! Erantor! Rezisitray!" This time, energy seared through the Doctor, himself, as each symbol on his torso glowed.

Only one part left, according to Giles' book.

The part where they sliced down into him, with every word, and killed him.

"Erkrias—!" shouted the first one, bringing the knife blade down towards his left heart.

A blond blur flipped through the air and roundoff-kicked the blade out of the demon's hand. It flew in an arc through the air, and the blond blur caught it, facing down the other demons.

"Wow," Buffy said, taking this all in. "I think I just landed in one of Xander's fantasies."

The demons hissed… then sprang at her.

Buffy dodged one of their blows, then kicked another and elbowed a third. One of the demons stabbed at her with its knife, but she caught its wrist and twisted it, hard, until the demon let go. A second snuck up from behind, but Buffy leaned down and tossed the first over her head, knocking the second demon to the ground.

Buffy stabbed them both, through the heart.

Then the air, around her, shuddered.

A cawing screech, like a wild bird squawking as it scratched against the windowpane of the world, echoed across their minds.

"The Dark Soul of the Vortex comes!" shouted the final demon.

Buffy looked over. The final demon was now straddling the Doctor, her dagger raised above his hearts.

"Erkri—!" shouted the demon, plunging the dagger down towards the Doctor.

Buffy ran over and shoved the demon off him, the dagger missing the Doctor's heart and only causing a glancing blow to his side. But even this amount of blood made the world shake, as the vortex creature gave another shrieking caw, and Buffy felt an explosion of time inside her head.

The final demon took advantage of Buffy's distraction to kick her away, and then tried to stab the Doctor, again. Buffy blinked, came back to herself, and punched the demon in the gut, then kicked her back and slammed a knife into her chest — only narrowly missing the demon's heart.

The demon whimpered, falling to the ground.

That was when the world began to tear, and Buffy could see the gigantic, glowing eye of the vortex creature, as it peered in at them. It opened its mouth, ready to devour. Buffy grabbed the final demon off the ground and — without thinking — hurled the demon into the tear in reality.

The final demon gave a blood-curdling scream, as she tumbled towards the vortex creature. The vortex creature gave a squawk that shook the world, yet again — and then gobbled the demon up.

The tear sealed.

The world stopped shaking.

Time stabilized.

Buffy dropped her dagger, as she looked around, checking everything out. No lingering damage. No more evil time creatures. Everything looked perfectly normal.

 _Except_ for the extremely undressed, badly cut up Time Lord, who was still struggling and manacled to the floor, in the center of the room. He kept saying something, but was muffled by a strip of duct-tape that had been stuck across his mouth.

Buffy went over to him, and yanked it off.

"This isn't how it looks!" the Doctor shouted, the first moment he could. He struggled, futilely. "Really! Cross both my hearts!"

Buffy crossed her arms.

"Uh… it _looks_ like you're getting ceremonially tortured and sacrificed to a vortex monster," Buffy pointed out. She gave him a hard glare. "So, if it's not that, then… what?" Her voice dropped. "Should I be worried?"

That made him look positively terrified.

Buffy couldn't help herself, anymore. She broke down, laughing.

"I also found Faith, and invited her back to Sunnydale, just so I could sleep with her," said the voice of the non-real Doctor that had led them there. He walked over to the real Doctor. "I really, really like having sex with everyone behind your back, because I'm just kind of like that!"

Oh, damn. Buffy had forgotten about him.

"Ignore that," Buffy said to the real Doctor. "I don't really think that about you."

The Doctor looked between Buffy and his not-so-flattering counterpart. Then he groaned, and closed his eyes. "On second thought — just let the vortex creature eat me."

Buffy responded by leaning down, and kissing him, passionately. A long, slow, deep kiss.

"Next time I say I'm stressed out, saving the world so much," Buffy said to him, "remind me how much more stressful this has been, for the last two weeks. Because I'll take monsters over thinking you don't love me, any day."

* * *

 _A few days later…_

"Yep, healed up and right as rain!" the Doctor said, now fully clothed and beaming. "And with the TARDIS back, I'm better than ever!" He stroked the outside, lovingly. "Welcome back, beautiful." Then, in a whisper, "You sexy, sexy thing, you."

Buffy coughed, pointedly.

The Doctor suddenly remembered that Buffy was around, and looked a bit flustered. "But not… like that. I mean, see, it's a bit… complicated…" He scratched the back of his neck, awkwardly.

Buffy rolled her eyes. She was starting to wonder if she shouldn't have been so worried about him running off and sleeping with other women, and should have been worried about him running off and being with his ship.

"You're still thinking about me manacled to the floor with all those demon women in bikinis, aren't you?" the Doctor asked, looking extremely worried that she still thought he was sleeping around.

Hm…

Naked Doctor chained to floor — now, that was actually an image she _had_ been thinking about.

Just not with the bikini people in it.

"I was kind of thinking," Buffy said, "that maybe… we could try that, again, but without the whole… bikini women, evil-vortex-monster-sacrifice thing?" She met his eyes. "You know? Just… the manacle parts."

The Doctor seemed surprised. "Oh." He shifted about, from foot to foot. "That some sort of… human thing?" He rolled his wrists. "Because, well, manacles aren't all that comfy, and I'd rather not…"

"Okay, okay," said Buffy. "Compromise." She lifted up a pair of handcuffs. "You wear these." She slunk forwards, towards him. "And we do it in the TARDIS — and let the ship join in…" she tapped the side of her head, "...up here."

A grin spread across his face, and he grabbed her by the waist.

"Deal," he said, and kissed her.


End file.
